Breaststroke Technique

BillieBob

Heya,

I've been swimming since I was a toddler and while I'm quite happy with my front crawl and back stroke (ok but need practice) I've never really got the hang of the breaststroke. Like most men I probably depend too much on my arms but I seem to get almost no go forward motion from my legs!

Has anyone any advice? or good web pages for me to look up,
thanks

Marvinthefish

This website is pretty interesting (first mentioned by trihead somewhere on this forum). It gives loads of different "camera angles" of animated swimmers doing each of the four strokes which you can freeze frame and the like. The animations are based on world and olympic champions, so their technique is probably good to learn from! Here is one of them doing the breaststroke.

That possibly isn't of any help if you're trying to nail the basics. If you feel you're using too much arms, why not do some lengths just kick with a board? I always try to concentrate on keeping my knees close together throughout the whole leg kick.

Quick Google search gave me this very American 34-slide slide show about breaststroke, this obviously named "www.breastroke.info" and this article on breaststroke kick at swimmersden.com

AngryHippie

Practice your kick lying on your back with a kickboard held to your chest, sit up a little so you can see your leg action.

BillieBob

Cheers, I'll try these tips the next time I'm in the pool